Deuteronomy 33:6-25 – Those Sibling Rivalries…Gotta Love ‘Em, Right?

Sibling rivalries. Unless you are an only child, you know about this topic. My brother and I were no different than any other set of siblings when it comes to this subject. We fought over everything. My brother is two weeks shy of being one and a half years older than me. My mother was only unpregnant for about nine months between the birth of my brother and when she got pregnant with me. Because of the way our birthdays fell, my brother and I were one grade apart in school. Competition between us was fierce, academic, athletic, you name it.

There are memories of our sibling rivalry that stick in your mind, random pictures of the subject that stick in your memory banks. One that sticks in my mind was like when I was 6 years old. My brother was in the second grade and I was in the first. It was the morning of his 8th birthday. Mom was making over him because it was his birthday and he was soaking it in. It was early in the morning on a school day. I remember (and honestly I don’t why I remember this) asking mom what time of day 8 years earlier that my brother was born. She said like it was like in the afternoon or something. I blurted it out that it wasn’t his birthday yet because that was like 6 or so hours away til the time he was born. I didn’t want him to have his birthday glory before it was time, ya know. I was jealous. Sibling rivalry. You don’t want any positive spotlights on your sibling that you can’t have yourself. A birthday was one of those exclusive things that is unique to each child. One of those days where the positive spotlight is squarely on them and not you and there is nothing you can do to change it.

Other sibling rivalries were our backyard basketball games at whatever parsonage we were living at over the years. Our basketball games grew less and less as we grew up. But there were years though where basketball games were a daily thing and particularly once we got done with our weekend chores on Saturday morning. Yes, we had chores, weekday ones and weekend ones. Weekend ones involved vacuuming, dusting, among other things. All those things that seemingly to us that your parents dreamed up to keep you from going to play on Saturday mornings. But once we got to play, our basketball games were quit fierce. My brother was always taller than me (and still is, by about 4 or 5 inches), so I developed and outside shot over the years so I would not have to go inside on him. However, sometimes, you just have to go inside (if your outside shot is not going well). I learned over the years to bump and bang with my brother on the inside game so I could create space for a shot with him rejecting it. Same thing on defense. I would bump him hard so that he couldn’t easily get his inside shots off. After a while, all the bumping and banging would get the better of us and we would degenerate into arguments. Sometimes the arguments would degenerate into football on the basketball court – tackling and fighting. Ah sibling rivalries!

It continued as teenagers when I started going steady with the girl who became my first wife. On weekends we would date and back in those days you would go find a secluded place in the late evening to go “park”. “Parking” would involve getting in the back seat of the car with your girlfriend and doing what teenage girls and boys do when alone. You would have music playing on the radio low. My brother was socially awkward at the time and rarely if ever had a date. So, on Fridays and Saturdays, he would hang out with one of his equally socially awkward friends. One of the games they would play was to find our where my girlfriend and I were “parking”. One place that we would park was in any of the cul-de-sacs of an, as yet, unfinished subdivision called Hampshire Hills. In Phase 2 of this subdivision, they had built the roads for it long before they started building the first house so it was a great place for TR kids to park. My brother one time with his friend found us and started throwing tennis balls at my car. Another time, he and friend pulled a log into the middle of the entrance to the cul-de-sec. Sibling rivalry was full on during our teenage years. And we won’t even talk about all the snide remarks, the arguments. As the years went by, I just didn’t like my brother very much at all. It took him leaving home to go off to college before our relationship started getting better. But oh back when we were at home, it was on!

My sibling rivalry with my brother was the first thing that popped into my mind this morning when I read through this passage, Deuteronomy 33:6-23. Let’s find out why after we read through this passage together now:

6 “Let Reuben live and not die,

nor[a] his people be few.”

7 And this he said about Judah:

“Hear, Lord, the cry of Judah;

bring him to his people.

With his own hands he defends his cause.

Oh, be his help against his foes!”

8 About Levi he said:

“Your Thummim and Urim belong

to your faithful servant.

You tested him at Massah;

you contended with him at the waters of Meribah.

9

He said of his father and mother,

‘I have no regard for them.’

He did not recognize his brothers

or acknowledge his own children,

but he watched over your word

and guarded your covenant.

10

He teaches your precepts to Jacob

and your law to Israel.

He offers incense before you

and whole burnt offerings on your altar.

11

Bless all his skills, Lord,

and be pleased with the work of his hands.

Strike down those who rise against him,

his foes till they rise no more.”

12 About Benjamin he said:

“Let the beloved of the Lord rest secure in him,

for he shields him all day long,

and the one the Lord loves rests between his shoulders.”

13 About Joseph he said:

“May the Lord bless his land

with the precious dew from heaven above

and with the deep waters that lie below;

14

with the best the sun brings forth

and the finest the moon can yield;

15

with the choicest gifts of the ancient mountains

and the fruitfulness of the everlasting hills;

16

with the best gifts of the earth and its fullness

and the favor of him who dwelt in the burning bush.

Let all these rest on the head of Joseph,

on the brow of the prince among[b] his brothers.

17

In majesty he is like a firstborn bull;

his horns are the horns of a wild ox.

With them he will gore the nations,

even those at the ends of the earth.

Such are the ten thousands of Ephraim;

such are the thousands of Manasseh.”

18 About Zebulun he said:

“Rejoice, Zebulun, in your going out,

and you, Issachar, in your tents.

19

They will summon peoples to the mountain

and there offer the sacrifices of the righteous;

they will feast on the abundance of the seas,

on the treasures hidden in the sand.”

20 About Gad he said:

“Blessed is he who enlarges Gad’s domain!

Gad lives there like a lion,

tearing at arm or head.

21

He chose the best land for himself;

the leader’s portion was kept for him.

When the heads of the people assembled,

he carried out the Lord’s righteous will,

and his judgments concerning Israel.”

22 About Dan he said:

“Dan is a lion’s cub,

springing out of Bashan.”

23 About Naphtali he said:

“Naphtali is abounding with the favor of the Lord

and is full of his blessing;

he will inherit southward to the lake.”

24“Most blessed of sons is Asher;let him be favored by his brothers,and let him bathe his feet in oil.25 The bolts of your gates will be iron and bronze,and your strength will equal your days.

As a person who grew up with a heated sibling rivalry always operating in the background of my family’s life, the thing that I noticed here was the different blessing given to each of the tribes of Israel. They were all different and not the same. Man, at my house when I was growing up, my brother and I would pick up on anything that was not equal between us. If my brother got X, if I got something that was perceived less than X was cause for family discontent. My parents had to tread softly when it came to gift giving, compliments, things that they would let us do and not do. But were times they had to fjord that river without caring what the results would be. Because my brother and I were totally different people with totally different issues growing up, they had to parent us differently. It caused jealousies, arguments, seething anger in us back then. But it was not until I became a parent myself that I understood how different your kids can be and how each requires a different approach, and sometimes a completely different parenting style.

That’s what you notice here is the different blessings. To one, God gave the best land. To another, strength. To another, safety. Too often in the church, like with our sibling rivalries growing up, we see someone with a particular blessing and think that God must love that person more than us. However, we should be looking at this thing from the perspective that God makes each one of us unique and that He has to “parent” each of us in the way that is right for us based on the talents that He gave us, the strengths that He has given us and the weaknesses He has given us. All of our combined gifts, strengths and weaknesses are all a necessary part of the body of Christ completing the commission it was given long ago by Jesus.

Let us not be envious of the blessings that God has given others. Instead, let us celebrate the diversity of gifts among His people and celebrate how God has brought all these different talents together at this one place at this one time in history to accomplish what God has for this particular body to accomplish in this place in this time. Let us resolve to quit looking horizontally and developing jealousies of what God is doing for this person over here and that person over there. Let us look vertically to the Lord and thank Him for the gifts that He has given us personally and resolve to serve Him in the ways that He has uniquely ordained us to serve Him. Let us not have rivalries with our brothers and sisters in Christ. Let us celebrate rather what God is doing through us collectively and be amazed him, the Mighty Conductor who orchestrates the symphony of the body of Christ.